In ages past, two vast temples to Thyr and Muir were erected in Bard’s Gate at the founding of that great city that still stands today. The priestly followers of these noble gods erected smaller duplicates of the twin temples in a small, secluded valley to the north of the city, adjacent to a lake of crystalline clarity. This valley became known as the Valley of the Shrines. In the nearby hills they also carved burial halls to house their fallen heroes and worshipers. For years the worship of Thyr and Muir thrived, producing heroes and paladins of legend, some of whom are entombed in the burial halls.
But new gods came, replacing the older gods. And the worship of Thyr and Muir in the secluded valley — both demanding deities — waned in favor of the more liberal gods of song, craft and commerce in the city of Bard’s Gate. Unable to maintain both the twin temples in Bard’s Gate and the complex in the Valley of the Shrines, the priests of Thyr and Muir sealed the northern shrines in the valley and returned their worship to the temples in the city. Abandoned, the burial halls still remained sacred places, and small groups of pilgrims continued to make treks to the sealed temples to pay respect to their fallen predecessors and to peer into the crystalline lake.
As the years passed, the shrines in the northern valley increasingly fell to disuse and ruin. Only a handful of devoted priests, led by the high priest Abysthor, were left to continue the elaborate rituals of their gods. Even the great twin temples in Bard’s Gate began to deteriorate. Despite Abysthor’s devotion, his temple and the worship of his gods in general waned.
In his final years, Abysthor spent many hours in the main temple in Bard’s Gate in communion with his deity. Declaring he had received a great vision, he traveled alone — aged and infirm — to the Valley of the Shrines, claiming he would return soon and that the glory of Thyr and Muir would be restored. Abysthor never returned. Some said he had gone there to die and had done so alone because no other priest could cast the spells necessary to consecrate him properly. Many groups of priests followed after him, though none could brave the corruption that had infested the burial halls since they had been abandoned.
Abysthor’s failed quest was taken as a sign of decline. It has been some twenty years since Abysthor disappeared. Only a handful of priests remain in the temples in Bard’s Gate, their cavernous temples falling to disuse, bereft of worshipers.
